“Oh, yes.” It sounded as if she was shrugging, not taking his words seriously.
“Hey, I thought you had a strange feeling that something terrible would happen. Where does the sudden insouciance come in?”
She laughed. “Oh, it's not about me. This feeling is about you. Your safety. Take care, will you?”
He smiled. When had someone last been worried about him? It surprised him how good it felt. “You bet.” He didn't want to interrupt the conversation though heaven knew he had other stuff to do. “Where are you?”
“I'm at home. You won't believe it, but Mama has decided to roast the corn to enhance the drying process. So we've collected every single frying pan there is in the house and are roasting grain on all the available stoves, in the hope that it'll dry before the mold gets to it.”
“Please tell me this is a joke.”
She chuckled. “It's not. You should see us. We're all here, all busy, and Mama is organizing us like a little ant army. We're schlepping heavy cast iron pans upstairs and downstairs as if we never did anything else. She even has involved Sofia, Rafaele's sister, plus Maria and Simonetta, and the rest of the family, of course. Benedetta and Leo are here too.” She dropped her voice. “They are really sweet, by the way, smiling at each other with stars in their eyes, but I'm not sure if Benedetta's kids have quite noticed what's going on.”
He couldn't decide if he felt relieved or worried that she was surrounded by her family and all the suspects in the murder case. Maybe there was safety in numbers. Maybe not.
It cost Garini a real effort to finish the conversation. He finally managed to ring off, called his thoughts to order and contacted Piedro. “Piedro. I have to go out of town to find some circus people. How is your research going?” Come to think of it, he hadn't heard much from Piedro these last days, and he hadn't missed him. Truth was, Piedro got on his nerves and only managed to slow him down, so he often preferred to work on his own, even though this was not the accepted thing to do. “Piedro? Are you there? Can you please say something?”
“Yes?” Piedro sounded a bit out of breath.
“Where are you?”
“I'm at the office, but I have only just arrived. Do you remember that you sent me to the lawyer?”
“Yes. But that was a long time ago. The last task I gave to you was to research Giorgio Pulo.”
“Oh. Yes.” Piedro sounded bored. “But I didn't find anything about him. There are about a million clowns called Beppo, did you know that?”
Garini curbed his impatience. “Yes, I did. So what did you do when you realized your research did not get you anywhere?” He had long ago reached the place where his bike was parked, but he couldn't mount it until he had finished the conversation. A pasta delivery van sped around the corner; its three wheels squealing. He turned his back to it and leaned against his bike.
“I remembered that the lawyer told me to look for certificates,” Piedro said. “Weddings, deaths, births, and so on. He said that this was standard procedure if someone died without having made a will, just to check, so to say.”
“Well, of course, but you had done that already, hadn't you?” It is standard procedure in every police investigation, too, and I have told you so three times already.
“Em.” Piedro cleared his throat. “Not quite.”
Garini clenched his teeth. “Why not?”
Piedro took a moment to answer. “Because you . . . you sent me to that cheese store and the butcher to check out the alibi of Benedetta Mantoni-Santorini, so I was busy. But as soon as I found a minute, I did. I thought it was really boring stuff, you see. In the past, it never got us anywhere.”
Garini rolled his eyes and didn't say anything.
“Anyway, I found something funny this afternoon.”
Garini fixed the phone between his shoulder and his ear and pushed his bike forward, his shoulders hunched. The sun had gone, and it had started to drizzle. The rain was creeping underneath his collar, making him feel clammy and cold. “Tell me what you found, Piedro.” He tried to make his voice sound patient though he wanted to shake his assistant. If he lost his temper now, his assistant would only slow down even more.
“Valentino Canderini was listed as the father of a child two years ago. The mother is Sofia Altori.”
Rafaele's sister! The one who had gotten pregnant and had lost her baby when it was two months old. The one who had never shared the name of the baby's father. What had her brother Rafaele said about Valentino? “I never thought he was charming.” I bet.
He had to re-think everything. Was it possible that Sofia was identical to Alana? Or had he been on a wild goose chase, and the two cases were not connected at all? Had sister and brother worked together to kill Valentino, in some sort of revenge? Sofia Altori and her brother Rafaele. Both in Via delle Pinzochere at this moment. Right in the middle of the Mantoni family. Right next to Carlina. A nasty feeling slithered down his spine. “Come to the Mantoni family home immediately.” He disconnected the phone, jumped onto his bike and hit the gas.
Chapter 14
Garini arrived with squealing tires in front of the Mantoni house.
The window next to the front door opened and Uncle Teo peered through the iron rods that protected the house from unwelcome visitors. “My, you're in a hurry, Commissario.” He smiled. “Wait a minute; I'll open the door for you.”
“Where is everybody?” Garini asked the second he was inside the house.
Uncle Teo made a vague move with his hand. “They're all milling about, roasting the corn. I got a bit tired and decided to retreat from the action.” He shook his head. “I'm not sure that the corn will ever recover from that treatment.” He lowered his voice. “Sometimes, Commissario, I wonder if Fabbiola isn't a bit . . . extreme.”
She's been extreme any time since I've met her. Garini nodded, thanked Uncle Teo, and hurried upstairs. The door to Fabbiola's apartment stood open. There was not a sound inside.
The hair on the back of his neck stood up. It was too silent. Had something terrible happened?
His phone beeped. He pulled it out and checked the display. “Can't join you. Got a sudden temperature. I think it's the flu. Am on my way to the doctor. Sorry. Piedro.” Garini narrowed his eyes. Soon, he would have to have a serious talk with his subordinate. He pushed the phone back into his pocket and looked around.
Still no sound. Eerie. He slid through the door and sidled along the wall, trying to avoid the corn spread out everywhere, until he reached Fabbiola's kitchen. Underneath his feet, stray corn crunched. To the musty smell, a new odor had been added, as if something was burning. With caution, he pushed the door open and peered inside. Nobody. The kitchen looked as if it had been left in a moment of panic. Pans with steaming corn were left on the stove, though at least they had managed to switch off the fire before storming out of the kitchen. A chair lay overturned on the floor. Corn was spread out on every flat surface, in bowls, pans, on plates, and sheets.
Suddenly, he heard a scraping sound and switched around. Where had that come from? Where was Carlina?
He left the empty apartment and returned to the staircase. Another sound guided him one floor down, to Benedetta's apartment. Again, the door was standing open. He went in and pushed through the door into Benedetta's kitchen, then froze.
Here they were. All of them. Sitting around the table, uncharacteristically silent, eating cake.
Carlina jumped up. “Stefano! I thought you--” She broke off and gave her family a self-conscious glance.
Tension broke from his shoulders. Thank God she was safe. He managed a smile. “Change of plans.” His gaze went around the table and came to rest on Sofia Altori. “I'd like a word with you, please. In private.”
Rafaele looked up.
Garini had never seen him move this quick.
“I'll join you.” It was a statement, calm and unshaken. He placed his fork next to his plate and got up with care.
“Why on earth do you want to talk to Sofi
a?” Benedetta cut in. “She has nothing to do with that murder. Nothing at all.”
Garini ignored her, just held the door open like an invitation and addressed Sofia directly. “I'd rather speak to you alone.”
Sofia paled, but she pressed her lips together and got up with a shrug. Her chair made a scraping sound on the tiles. “Rafaele can come. I don't mind.”
“But I do mind,” Garini said in his most dulcet tones.
She gave him a doubtful look. “Better stay here then, Rafi.”
Garini waited until she had preceded him, then, on the spur of the moment, he turned around. “I'd like to talk to Sofia in your apartment, if I may, Carlina.” He didn't have to spell it out. She would know that her apartment was the only place in the house which could be bolted on the inside, avoiding unexpected interruptions in the middle of the interview. All the other locks in the apartment doors were identical, allowing every single member of the Mantoni family free access at any time.
“Sure.” She bit her lips.
Rafaele frowned. “I'll join you. Five minutes.”
Garini ignored him. He led Sofia upstairs, waited until she had taken a seat on Carlina's favorite armchair with the leopard print rug, then bolted the door behind them. “Please note that I am not doing this to intimidate you, but I would like to have a calm conversation without interruptions.”
“I understand.”
He sat on the sofa. “Do you agree to my taping your statement? I also have to tell you that you have the right to demand the presence of a lawyer.”
“That won't be necessary.” She seemed calm, and her hands were folded in her lap. “Of course you can tape our conversation.”
He nodded and started the machine, noted the time as well as her full name and address. Then he looked up, taking her measure.
She met his gaze without flinching. “What do you need to know, Commissario?”
He was impressed. At first glance, she looked like Maria, but underneath, it seemed the two women were poles apart. Where Maria was emotional, Sofia was collected. Where Maria was impulsive, Sofia thought everything through before talking. She wasn't a shivering girl, waiting for the inevitable to happen. She was a young woman who would take things into her own hands when necessary. Maybe her early motherhood and the loss of her child had made her more mature than her age. Maybe it was her family. After all, the Altoris were famous for being even-tempered. He wondered what it would take for one of them to snap and if the result would prove to be more disastrous than the quick flare of more nervous people.
“Did you know Valentino Canderini?”
“Of course I did.” She answered without hesitation. “My mother is a close friend of both Benedetta and Fabbiola, and my brother Rafaele practically grew up with Ernesto, so throughout the years, I got to know all the members of the Mantoni family . . . more or less, that is.”
“Did you know him well?”
She returned his gaze without flinching. “Yes.”
“Please tell me more about your relationship with him.”
For the first time since the interview had started, she looked at her hands and seemed to hesitate. Then she lifted her head, took a deep breath, and said. “We were lovers.”
He didn't say anything, hoping she would continue without being prompted.
She bit her lips. “We kept it a secret because we didn't want our families to fuss. It was very romantic. I thought he--” she broke off and blushed. “I thought he was serious. My mistake.” Her slim shoulders lifted. “One day, out of the blue, he told me he would go to Dubai. He had gotten a great job offer. He would come back, rich and successful, and then, we would have a great time.” She pressed her lips together, then, with a sudden turn of her head, she looked at him with a piercing gaze from her dark blue eyes. “You know about the baby, I guess? You checked the files?”
He inclined his head. “I know.”
“That was the day I realized I was pregnant. I told him about the baby. I asked him to change his mind and stay. He was horrified.” Her gaze went beyond him, to Carlina's window seat, to the gray sky outside.
Garini doubted that she noticed anything in the present.
“He asked me to get rid of the baby. He asked me to keep it a secret. That was the moment I fell out of love with him.” She swallowed so hard he could see it. “He was the most selfish person I ever met.”
“What happened then?”
“I pretended to go along with him. I didn't have the strength to fight, and I didn't want to beg. I returned home and decided to get rid of him once and for all.”
Garini lifted an eyebrow. If she had killed Valentino, she had waited a long time for her revenge to take place. It had happened before, and he could picture her planning his death in a deliberate way. However, he didn't quite see her admitting to it without batting an eyelid.
“I decided to have my baby, but I didn't tell anybody the name of the father.”
“You did register him as the father on the birth certificate, though. You could have said that the father was unknown.”
Her back stiffened. “I wanted to do that. But when it came to the point, I just couldn't. It sounded as if I was a slut, as if I had slept with so many men that I couldn't even figure out who was the father.” She slumped. “I couldn't do that. So I put down his name, but I hid the birth certificate in a bank as soon as I could. I never told anybody, not even my mother.”
“Nobody at all? In all that time?”
Her gaze slid away from him. “No.”
He was sure she was lying.
She looked up at him. “Can you keep it to yourself?” Her voice was pleading. “My little girl is dead. It doesn't matter anymore, does it?”
A knock interrupted them. “Let me in!” Rafaele shouted. The knock became a boom. “I have something to say to you!”
Garini sighed and got up. “It would have been too good to be true.” He shot the bolt to the side.
Before he could open the door, Rafaele pushed it so hard that it banged against the wall. He jumped into the room. With a swift movement, he held both his wrists out to Garini and said. “It was me. I killed the bastard. You can handcuff me now.”
“What?” Sofia jumped up. “Have you gone crazy?”
Garini watched the siblings like a hawk, noting every expression, every move.
“I'm sorry, Sofia.” After his unprecedented burst of action, Rafaele seemed shaken. “I can't change what I've done, but I won't let you take the blame for it.”
“Me? What blame?” Sofia stared at her brother. “You can't have done it! You have an alibi, don't you?”
Garini lifted an eyebrow. If he remembered correctly, Ernesto had tried to pick up Rafaele at his house during the crucial time, but Rafaele had not been at home.
Rafaele shook his head. “No alibi. I was here. I killed him.”
“But why?” Sofia threw up her hands. “Why should you do that? I don't believe it!”
He gave her a long look, full of pity and tenderness.
She choked. “Oh, my God. You mean you did it because of . . . me? But I never told you about . . . about . . .” Her voice petered out.
“I knew.” His voice was low.
Her mouth fell open. “You knew? You never let on.”
“I'm not blind, Sofia.” He swallowed. “However, I realized you wanted to keep it a secret. I hated him for what he did to you.” Rafaele clenched his fists.
Sofia's eyes grew wide. “So you . . . killed him? Just like that?”
He clenched his teeth. “He deserved it.”
“Can you describe how it happened?” Garini cut in.
Rafaele turned to him as if he had forgotten that he was there. “Well, I . . . I went in.”
“Why?”
Rafaele gave a start. “What do you mean, why?”
“Why did you go into Carlina's apartment?”
He blushed. “I . . . I can't recall. I thought I'd heard Ernesto up here. Must have been mistaken.”
Garini frowned. “And then?”
“He was standing there.” Rafaele pointed at the spot where the ugly rug still covered the blood stained floor.
“Did he have his back to you?”
Rafaele blinked. “Yes. No. I can't remember.”
“Go on.”
“I saw him. Silk boxer shorts. Bottle of champagne.”
“What color were the boxer shorts?” Garini's questions came hard and fast.
“White?” He shrugged. “I don't know. It all happened so quick.”
The boxer shorts were dark gray. “Where was the bottle of champagne?”
Rafaele hesitated. “There.” He pointed at the low table in front of the sofa.
“To the left? To the right?”
“In the middle, sort of.” Sweat formed on Rafaele's brow.
It must have been at the far left to be spattered with blood. “What happened then?”
“I saw red.” Rafaele shrugged. “Took a knife,--”
“Where did you get it from?”
“What?”
“The knife. You didn't walk up here with a knife in your hand, did you?”
“Em. No. I . . . I took it from Carlina's kitchen.”
“But it was Benedetta's knife.”
He shrugged. “Stuff wanders about in this house.”
That much at least is true. Garini frowned. “Why did you see red?”
“I knew what he had done to my sister.”
“But he was not threatening your sister at this moment.”
“He was. I had expected him to come back and make amends. He would have ruined her life. Again.”
Sofia gasped. “Make amends? I would not have taken him back if he had begged me.”
Rafaele gave her an uncertain look. “You sure?”
“Positive.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest.
“Besides--” Rafaele shuffled his feet.
“Spit it out,” Garini said.
“Besides, Ernesto told me Carlina didn't like his cousin, and that she only had eyes for you. I didn't think that the surprise Valentino had staged would make her happy.”
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